Let’s face it, the bad stuff just doesn’t really feel good at all. It is not appealing to think about facing those feelings that seek to cause you discomfort and heartache. Face those thoughts that dredge up old memories. Look at those deep dark places within you that threaten to expose your most vulnerable parts. The bad stuff starts to surface and the instinct that rises to the surface is to run and find a way to make those feelings go away.

There are so many things we do to run away. There is denial, destruction, avoidance, over-indulgence, and even depression. We find whatever ways we can, whether consciously or not, to avoid having to feel all that bad crap and keep ourselves moving forward.

What makes this worse these days, is the focus on thinking positive. We have gotten to this place where everyone seems to have the same answer for anyone’s problems…”Just think positive.” It’s almost a sign of weakness or something if you make an attempt to go into the yucky stuff that may be surfacing. And yes, focus and mindset are a major component in succeeding at any goal and a big part of what I teach all of my clients.

So that begs the question of what you are supposed to do when the inevitable moments of feeling the bad stuff come up. Can you just positively think your way out of having to face them?

Lately, I have been noticing something that so many women seem to struggle with on a daily basis. I know I have in the past, and honestly, at times I still do. I have had to learn techniques and become very aware around it so that I do not allow this habit to run my life.

Do you have a guess as to what it may be?

Women are way too hard on themselves!

Being hard on yourself shows up in a variety of different ways and half of the time, you probably don’t even realize you are doing it. You may wonder why you are feeling badly, having a hard time loving yourself, and struggling to reach your goals. You may think it has something to do with the outside circumstances of your life. Maybe your dead-end job or the partner that isn’t giving you what you need, but it really never has anything to do with the outside world.

I remember after my separation and divorce constantly being in a state of wonder. Where had it all gone wrong and what if I could have done something somewhere along the way to have made things better? Would things have been different or would they have ended exactly as they did anyway? I would literally obsess about it and I can remember long sleepless nights with my head spinning around and around. I couldn’t seem to stop. It was like I was trying to uncover some magical answer that would somehow make it all have meaning and make sense.

Something tells me you know exactly what I am talking about. That constant obsession about the past with all the different scenarios you are playing in your head, on repeat, waiting for the answer that is going to set you free.

My guess is it sounds something like this…..

What if I made the wrong decision?What if I make the wrong decision?What if he changes?What if I change?What if I never find love again?What if it is all my fault?What if I am crazy?What if I am unlovable?What if he is the best I can ever get?What if I don’t deserve to be loved?
The list goes on and on……

The “What If” game is extremely dangerous and will keep you stuck and emotionally hooked to your Ex and the relationship. By constantly obsessing about the past you will remain in pain about your breakup, re-traumatizing yourself over and over. You will continue to criticize and judge yourself, knocking your self-esteem lower and lower. The “what If” game will guarantee that you will not be able to let go, move on, and heal.

So why play this game? I mean, it’s not like it feels good to obsess over and over in your head about all the possibilities. As a matter of fact, it feels awful.Yet, you can’t seem to stop. You are distracted by your thoughts, you can’t sleep, you can’t eat or maybe you can’t stop eating. The “What If” game has taken over your life and is turning you into your worst enemy.

You are going along day by day and feel like things are really great. You can honestly look at yourself and say that this has been the best week of your life since the divorce. I mean, you really feel like you are getting it. All that reading, personal growth, and yoga has really been paying off. This must be it…this must be what it feels like to finally be free of the awful emotional burden of divorce. You are smiling, you are joyful, and believe it or not, you are actually feeling hopeful. Maybe your life is actually about to be normal, maybe even great. You are ready to scream it from the mountaintops and then….. BAM!!! One unexpected interaction with your ex and you are suddenly spiraling down a black hole into the abyss of heartache again.

You feel disheartened and immediately question what the heck is wrong with you. How many times can you actually let this happen, and you reason that you will never move past this pain in your life. All that joy and hope quickly turns to despair and you question all that work you have been doing… the reading, personal growth, and yoga doesn’t work at all. What’s the point of doing any of it when you end up right back in this awful pit of pain anyway? Life is not normal, and certainly is never going to be great.

Does this cycle sound familiar? Is this a pattern you tend to repeat over and over? And do you wonder if it is ever going to end?

Well… you may not like what I am going to tell you here, but I am going to tell you anyway…

After coming out of relationships, one of the many things that I hear from women is that they don’t love themselves. I know for me, when my marriage ended, I didn’t even like myself. Scratch that, I was a stranger to myself, so I didn’t even know who I was to even like what I saw. What I did know was that I needed to go on a journey to falling in love with me.

Falling in love with yourself is a beautiful journey that involves a process of discovery, growth, healing, and forgiveness. There are moments that are painful and moments that are joyous, and all are necessary to bring you home to yourself.

Do you ever take the time to reflect on your life and revisit the path you have travelled thus far?

When I look back and reflect on my life, the word that comes into my mind over and over again is, FULL. I have lived a life full of laughter, joy, sadness, heartbreaks, disappointments, really bad decisions, really good decisions, awful mistakes, and huge lessons. I have had to find my way through experiences that seemed impossible and I have had my moments when everything seemed perfect. Me being the person I am, I have felt things deeply and profoundly, in the only way my sensitive soul knows how. I have had to pick myself back up (a few times), learn some really tough, but cool shit, and grown a lot more than I ever thought I would need to.

For a very long time, my experience of reflection was also known as my experience of beating myself up. I would look back at my life and go over all the things that I could have done differently. My endless mantras of “what if,” “if only,” and “how could I” played on repeat over and over in my head. It wasn’t that I necessarily had regrets, more that I couldn’t give myself a break for the choices I made to get me to where I was. As you can imagine, this did not feel good and certainly did not get me anywhere.

Then I discovered the answer, or at least I thought I had.

Stop looking back at the past and keep moving forward. I learned that if I constantly stayed busy and kept striving toward something in my future, I didn’t have to reflect on my past and deal with the cycle of beating myself up. And besides, everyone was talking about being positive, so I figured I must have it right!

Perhaps you are experiencing the end of a relationship, or maybe the death of someone you love, or possibly some other injustice in your life. Whatever the experience, I wonder how many times have you wanted to scream from the top of your lungs “IT’S NOT FAIR!!” That this is absolutely not what was supposed to happen, that you don’t deserve this, that you did everything right. How many of you want to scream out “WHY?!?!?? Why is this happening to me?!?!?!?”

If you are anything like I was at the end of my marriage and when my father passed away, you have felt this way or are feeling this way now. It is almost like your inner two- year-old wants to kick and scream and throw a complete tantrum on the floor. The anger and resentment threaten to boil over and you have to hold yourself together with everything you have.

Does this sound familiar???

Couple things…

First… Life is not fair.

I know you have heard this statement a million times and it may even be one of the most frustrating truths you have to listen to, but it is unfortunately the truth. Life is not fair. It is a sentence I repeat to my son over and over again, attempting to instill within him the lesson that “Life is not fair. The sooner you make peace with that, the happier you will be.”

It’s a new year and that means it is the season for resolutions and intentions. You get so excited to make these changes and promises to yourself, sure that you will follow through this time, confident that nothing will get in your way. This is going to be your year, the year everything changes.

And then… life happens. Maybe you’ll get sick or stay out late one night. Maybe you’ll suffer a devastating loss or become faced with financial hardship. Perhaps, the world falls apart around you, or perhaps you just slowly give up. But either way you lose sight of your resolution, your intention, and inevitably, you are back in your same old patterns and nothing has changed.

Even worse, you failed yourself once again, confirming that things will never change for you and this must just be the life you are meant to live. You have gathered further evidence of the things you “can-not” do and have learned to trust yourself a little bit less. This fear driven life pattern is controlling your world and without realizing it, you are letting yourself be guided by the part of you that wants you to play it small and avoid being seen.

Have you ever longed for something so badly it hurt?

I am guessing that each and every one of us can think of something that they have longed for or desired.

Something you could feel throughout your entire being when you thought about having it.

You prayed for it, wished for it, or maybe you pretended not to want it because it hurt too bad.

For someone it may be a relationship, while for others it could be as simple as support or human touch.

Whatever it is, I imagine that at some point we have all known this feeling and maybe will again.

What I have noticed is that most of us come at this state of desire or want with a sense of sadness and worry. We see the world through the eyes of not having the thing we want most and all that is missing in our life as a result.

We question ourselves and wonder what it is we are doing wrong, why have we not found a way to find what we want so badly? Is there something wrong with us? Are we not deserving? Have we somehow pissed off karma for the rest of our eternity?

We seek out ways to be better, look for answers to our questions, and search for miracles. We walk around looking behind every corner wondering if it will finally appear.

Will this be the day, the moment, the hour that everything makes sense and the waiting is over?

We do that enough times and then something shifts. Maybe we close off our feelings and decide we never really wanted it anyway. Afraid to feel hope any longer, afraid of what it will mean if it never actually happens.

I too have been in this place and I know how it feels. I can tell you it does not feel good and certainly doesn’t get us to where we want to be.

So how do we shift from a state of lack toward a state of abundance?

I have learned that throughout our days we will crave and desire things that are most likely not in our control.

We may wish for affection, support, laughter, or simply to be seen.

We may long for forgiveness from an old friend, or be dying to meet our soul mate. Whatever it is, it is in these moments that we hold the power to create what we desire.

When you wish for affection, give someone a hug.

In need of support? Offer your support to a friend.

Wanting forgiveness? I ask you, have you forgiven yourself?

Craving laughter, make it your mission to make someone smile.

Longing to find love, fall in love over and over again with you.

Everything you want, anything you desire lives within you, inside of your heart and soul.

Abundance is a decision you make and a habit you must actively create.

Day by day, moment by moment, you decide how to show up and interact within the world you live. You cannot control outside circumstances, but you certainly can control your internal state and the type of world you choose to see.

When you make the choice to give the thing you desire, you are then in active creation with the world and your reality becomes exactly what you had desired. You create the world in which you wish to live.

Are you hiding from the life you are meant to live?

If you are anything like the majority of the people I speak with, you are busy.

Very busy.

You are balancing a million things to find that later on that you left little or no time for yourself. You have a list of the many things you want to do or achieve in your life, but unfortunately, you just don’t have the time. You have all these important responsibilities that prevent you from taking steps you know you must take in order to live a life that makes you feel truly fulfilled and joyous. You keep on thinking that maybe one day you will have the time to focus on yourself, but that day just keeps getting pushed further and further away.

Can you relate? I know that I can.

I spent years filling my days with overwhelm and busyness, never having a moment to sit down and have time for me. I would have these ideas or inspirations come to me and would quickly sweep them away because I didn’t have the time to pursue them. I felt stuck, and resigned myself to believe that I was just not meant to live a life that I was truly excited and passionate about. After all, there was just not enough time in a day for me to complete everything I needed to, plus take the risk of exploring these crazy ideas and inspirations.